Tupac biopic All Eyez On Me blasted by critics, yet has huge opening at US box office

The eagerly-awaited biopic of the life, times and crimes of Tupac Shakur has finally hit screens in the US.

Already, Jada Pinkett-Smith and 50 Cent have spoken out against the film, with Pinkett-Smith going so far as to call the film's reimagining of her relationship with Tupac as "deeply hurtful." Meanwhile, the reviews have all been resoundingly negative, with a Metacritic rating of 40% and a Rotten Tomatoes score of just 24%.

RogerEbert.com was particularly brutal towards the film, calling it "one of the most useless music biopics ever made... too confusing for newcomers and too underwhelming for those familiar with the work and the life of rap prophet Tupac Shakur."

Vulture, meanwhile, called it "rarely more than a faithful adaptation of the rapper’s Wikipedia entry, so fixated on name-checking every footnote of Shakur’s public life that there is no space to explore the experience of the man himself," whilst Little White Lies called it "an exercise in how not to make a music biopic."

Despite all this, the film has managed to pull off a strong opening with $31.5 million banked so far in the US and came in third place, opening the same weekend against Disney's Cars 3.

All Eyez On Me is slated for an Irish release on June 30th, and we'll have our own review hopefully before then.